Apple (finally) lets you give iPhone apps as gifts

Users have long been able to gift movies and music from iTunes to other people …

Apple gave us a nice Monday surprise as it added the ability to buy an app for a friend or acquaintance as a gift via the App Store. The feature has long been available for music and movies, but until today had been mysteriously absent from the App Store since its launch almost two years ago.

If you have tried to download an iPhone or iPod touch app from the App Store after about noon (CDT) today, you will have likely be confronted with a requirement to read and agree to new App Store terms of service, which is how we were alerted to the change. It took some time for the update to propagate in the App Store system, but the drop down menu next to the price of every app offers the option to "Gift This App" in addition to "Add To Wishlist" or "Share via Facebook." We confirmed with Apple that the functionality is available store-wide, and an Apple spokesperson told Ars that she thinks the feature is "pretty cool."

There are some limitations to this, however. Gifts can only apply to the purchase price of the app—it won't work for in-app purchases or subscriptions, or for buying updates to iPhone OS for the iPod touch. Also, you cannot use gift card credit to buy a gift for someone else. Finally, gifts are strictly non-refundable.

The feature is really great, though, for users who want to give a specific app to a friend instead of a generic gift card. It's also great for developers or publishers who want to give review copies or giveaways without using up their limited promo codes.

[quote=]It's also great for developers or publishers who want to give review copies or giveaways without using up their limited promo codes.[/quote]

Being forced to pay for an app I created in order to give it away is great? Also why would I purchase an app to give it away instead of handing out a promo code. What is so special about these promo codes that I'd hoard them?

Uh, how dare a tech blog put Apple news in a section of a tech blog dedicated to Apple news? Not feeling the outrage here. This is worship?

And though the feature kind of falls short, it's a welcome additional choice for an iTunes customer to have.

I think a lot of the limitations in the sales models on the app store have to do with all the legacy iTunes store code under the hood. There's a lot of iTunes cruft in the App Store submission tools.

Perhaps the purchase of lala will help them modernize the store, but few commerce destinations on the Internet have to scale the same way that iTunes does. Millions of catalog items, tens of thousands of servers, and a relatively complex multinational transaction system that queues up purchases with the credit card companies -- try to make a change without breaking something.

[quote=]It's also great for developers or publishers who want to give review copies or giveaways without using up their limited promo codes.

Being forced to pay for an app I created in order to give it away is great? Also why would I purchase an app to give it away instead of handing out a promo code. What is so special about these promo codes that I'd hoard them?

Oh yeah, FALSE SCARCITY FTW!!![/quote]

This. Plus is would cost the developer more to gift an app then they would get back for it from apple.

Well, Aurich, you are attempting somewhat of an elision there, which I think undermines the point you were trying to make: the fact is that Wired and ArsTechnica are now both owned by Conde Nast. The relationship between corporate and editorial is probably not as chummy as conspiracy nuts prefer to believe, but you are never going to convince the conspiracy nuts of such a fact.

Refutation of conspiracies aside, I'm glad to see Apple making this move but it would be even nicer if the world of software would approach the world of objects where I can give software I've bought for myself but didn't like to someone else, to whom it might be better suited. I think all of us have done this over the years with various applications -- and I think this should be a perfectly legitimate, in the sense of legal, thing to do. I should be able to give someone software and the license, after I have uninstalled it from my own machine.

This is less possible in the new application ecosystem, and, frankly, it sucks. It sucks even if you don't give software away. At some point, iTunes had cocked up a couple of upgrades of iPhone apps and I did some hand pruning to get rid of duplication. What I discovered was that iTunes wouldn't let me upgrade the pruned down apps because i had broken some chain of ownership. This is just nonsensical. The same applies if you buy an iPhone app with one iTunes account and later switch to a different account: you must maintain the old account if only so you can authorize upgrades to apps purchased under that account.

On the one hand the Steam/iTunes model is amazingly convenient. However it comes with a lot of strings that have yet, to my mind, be successfully worked out to the consumer's advantage.

And to the Apple trolls -- yeah, I see your feet hanging out from under the bridge -- I know this plays right into your beef with Apple and the sheeple who buy into their ecosystem. Thanks for posting.

Folks, it's all about the books! Among largest flaws in current Kindle model is the inability to give a Kindle formatted title as a gift. Sending an Amazon gift card ample enough to cover the price of the title just isn't the same. Much of the joy in both giving and receiving books as gifts is the way in which a particular title reflects how the giver experiences the recipient. Bringing title specific gifting to the App Store within iTunes closes the gap - a lot.

"...would be even nicer if the world of software would approach the world of objects where I can give software I've bought for myself but didn't like to someone else, to whom it might be better suited. I think all of us have done this over the years with various applications -- and I think this should be a perfectly legitimate, in the sense of legal, thing to do. I should be able to give someone software and the license, after I have uninstalled it from my own machine. "

There's no law against that, or against reselling it. And most software companies follow the First Sale Doctrine which allows the resale of said software.

Most include the lines - Allowed to make 1 backup copy....Only able to install on 1 machine at a time - on sale, Original owner must destroy any backup copies or sell them.

Can you post some guidelines as to how often Ars should post Apple news? Frequency of articles? Length? You seem to have it all figured out, so why not enlighten us? Shirley, Ars doesn't have a section called Infinite Loop dedicated to Apple news. Shirley not.

Well, Aurich, you are attempting somewhat of an elision there, which I think undermines the point you were trying to make: the fact is that Wired and ArsTechnica are now both owned by Conde Nast. The relationship between corporate and editorial is probably not as chummy as conspiracy nuts prefer to believe, but you are never going to convince the conspiracy nuts of such a fact.

I'm making a simple point: We are not owned by Wired, they have zero ability to influence our editorial policy in any way shape or form. Of course Condé Nast owns us both, it's not a secret.